stcatherineofsiena1
St. Catherine of Siena
Feastday: April 29
Patron: Fire prevention
Birth: March 25, 1347
Death: 1380
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BIRTH
St. Catherine of Siena was born on March 25, 1347 in Siena, Italy. It was the day of the Annunciation, which was the Palm Sunday of that year. It was also around the time of the outbreak of the plague in Siena.
She was the 23rd child of Jacopo and Lapa Benincasa. Almost half of her siblings did not survive childhood, even her twin sister died during infancy. Her mother was 40 years old when she gave birth to Catherine. Her father was a cloth dryer.
Catherine grew up as an intelligent, cheerful, and intensely religious person. She had the nickname “Euphrosyne.” She was so joyful as a child that her family called her “Euphrosyne,” which is Greek for “joy.”
Image: Saint Catherine of Siena among Saints and Blessed Sieneses (Santa Caterina da Siena tra santi e beati senesi), by Ventura Salimbeni, 1608, 17th century, fresco Siena Cathedral
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EARLY LIFE
Image: Being carried through the air as a child
It was clear from early childhood that Providence had important designs for the little girl. The Holy Spirit frequently acted in Catherine’s soul by means of mystical phenomena that were often manifested externally. For example, while yet a child, she used to be carried up and down the stairs in the air, with her feet scarcely touching the steps as she moved.
The childhood of this providential soul was marked by an intense piety, instilling in her an ardent desire to give herself to God. Her only wish was to kneel and make acts of reverence and love to the Blessed Mother of God.
When she was 7 years old, she had the first of her mystical visions. in She saw Jesus surrounded by saints and seated in glory. In that same year, she took a vow of virginity before an altar of the Blessed Virgin, and some time later she was mystically wed to Our Lord Jesus Christ in the presence of Our Lady, St. Paul, St. John the Evangelist, St. Dominic and King David.
Image: The cutting of her hair to signify her break with the world
At the age of 16, Catherine’s parents proposed that she get married. Catherine's sister, Bonaventura, died which left her husband as a widower. Catherine's parents proposed that he marry Catherine as a replacement, but Catherine opposed this. She began fasting and cut her hair short to make her look less appealing.
In response to the young woman’s drastic attitude, and in order to persuade her to change her mind, her family burdened her with domestic chores and no longer allowed her to withdraw to her room to pray.
She accepted this turn of events without resistance, dedicating herself to domestic work with an abnegated spirit and religious detachment. In the face of her inspired words and moved by the action of grace, her father was convinced that she was guided by the Holy Spirit and no longer raised obstacles to the divine will. Her father ordered the family to let her fulfil her vocation in peace.
Catherine once explained that she regarded her father as a representation of Jesus and her mother as Our Lady, and her brothers as the apostles, which helped her to serve them with humility.
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LIFE AS A PREACHER
After a vision in which St. Dominic of Guzman promised her the habit of his Order, the young woman summoned her courage and told her family that she was called to belong to the Dominican Third Order. In her vision, St. Dominic himself appeared to convince her to be a Dominican tertiary, something that at the time was normally reserved for widows. She also got special permission to wear a habit.
Despite Catherine's religious nature, she did not choose to enter a convent and instead she joined the Third Order of St. Dominic, which allowed her to associate with a religious society while living at home.
Saint Catherine of Siena as Spiritual Mother of the Second and Third Orders of Saint Dominic by Cosimo Rosselli
She entered the Dominican Third Order at 18 and spent the next three years in seclusion, prayer, and austerity. Desiring to serve God radically in her new way of life, she decided to adopt a regime of complete silence and the only words she spoke were her sins to the confessor. During that time, her soul remained absorbed in heavenly communication, conversing with the Blessed Trinity and mystically glimpsing the divine mysteries. She had constant mystical experiences with an extraordinary union with God granted to only a few mystics, known as ‘mystical marriage.’
Initially, she lived her vocation as a Dominican tertiary in silent isolation in her family’s home. But when she was 21 years old, she experienced a vision of Jesus in which he wed her as his bride, and even gave her a ring. She was then told by Christ to leave her solitude and serve the poor, which she did.
She ended her solitude and began tending to the sick, poor, and marginalized, especially lepers. As her reputation for holiness and remarkable personality became known throughout Siena, she attracted a band of disciples, two of whom became her confessors and biographers, and together they served Christ in the poor with even greater ardor. Gradually, a group of followers gathered around her—men and women, priests and religious. An active public apostolate grew out of her contemplative life.
Saint Catherine of Siena heals Matteo Cenni, fresco by Vincenzo Tamagni
Catherine was drawn further into the world as she worked, and eventually she began to travel, calling for reform of the Church and for people to confess and to love God. On one occasion, she visited a condemned political prisoner and was credited with saving his soul, which she saw being taken up to heaven at the moment of his death. Catherine also performed countless works of charity. She rendered services in hospitals and, during the plague of 1374, she dedicated herself to assisting the infected, working countless cures. Aided by the gift of miracles, she favored especially those who were spiritually infirm, converting many sinners with inspired words.
She was also an exorcist: with just one sign of the Cross she freed a soul vexed by diabolical attacks. Her holy gestures struck terror in hell and were instrumental in the salvation of the faithful.
In a vision, Our Lord offered her two crowns: one of roses and another of thorns. Catherine, without hesitation, chose that of thorns, taking it as a sign of the way of suffering on Calvary which He had traced out for her.
Our Lord offering the two crowns – Oratorio della Camera in the Sanctuary of the House of St. Catherine, Siena (Italy)
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SIGNIFICANT CONTRIBUTIONS
Catherine was very politically active as well. In her late 20s, she started dictating letters with scribes to various rulers and clergy, begging for peace between states. Great political acts which are attributed to her include achieving peace between the Holy See and Florence who were at war, to convince the Pope to return from his Avignon exile, which he did in 1376, and to heal the great schism between the followers of the legitimate Pope, Urban VI, and those who opposed him in 1380. She was key in working to keep city states loyal to the Pope.
She was so respected, she was sent on diplomatic peace missions by various governments. She worked tirelessly within temporal society. She sought to pacify the conflicts that divided cities, but this came at the price of injustices and persecutions against her.
In 1378, the Great Schism began, splitting the allegiance of Christendom between two, then three, popes and putting even saints on opposing sides. Catherine spent the last two years of her life in Rome, in prayer and pleading on behalf of the cause of Pope Urban VI and the unity of the Church.
She offered herself as a victim for the Church in its agony. Her life, marked by good works and penance, was thus offered up as a holocaust. Fatigue and weakness gradually dominated her body, although her spirit grew continually stronger. She prayed unceasingly for the Church, recommending it to the care of Our Lady, for she foresaw that the adversities it was undergoing at that time were nothing as compared with the tragic events it would experience in the future.
Saint Catherine of Siena by Juan Bautista Maíno (1612 - 1614). Oil on panel
Catherine also established a monastery for women in 1377 outside of Siena. She is credited with composing over 400 letters, her Dialogue, which is her definitive work, and her prayers. She is one of the most influential and popular saints in the Church. These works are so influential that St. Catherine would later be declared a Doctor of the Church.
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DEATH
By 1380, Catherine, who was only 33 years old, had become ill. It is possible that her illness is due to her habit of extreme fasting. Her confessor, Raymond, ordered her to eat. But she replied that she found it difficult to do so, and that possibly she was ill.
In January of 1380, her illness accelerated her inability to eat and drink. Within weeks, she was unable to use her legs. She died in Rome on April 29, 1380, following a stroke just a week prior. Her body was buried in the Basilica of Santa Maria sopra Minerva in Rome, where her mortal remains rest today, under the main altar.
In 1375, while visiting Pisa, she received the stigmata, even though they never appeared on her body during her lifetime, owing to her request to God. They appeared only on her incorruptible body after her death.
"The Death Of Saint Catherine Of Siena" oil on Canvas
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CANONIZATION
Pope Pius II Canonizes St Catherine of Siena, from the famous Piccolomini library in the cathedral of Siena, by Pinturicchio, 1502-8.
St. Catherine was canonized by Pope Pius II in 1461 and Paul VI granted her the title of Doctor of the Church.
Catherine ranks high among the mystics and spiritual writers of the Church. In 1939, she and Francis of Assisi were declared co-patrons of Italy. Pope Paul VI named her and Teresa of Avila doctors of the Church in 1970. Her spiritual testament is found in The Dialogue.
She was declared as the co-patron saint of Italy and of Europe. She is the patroness against fire, illness, the United States, Italy, miscarriages, people ridiculed for their faith, sexual temptation, and nurses.
St. Catherine's feast day is April 29.
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